Writer: Casey Chong

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Effects: NA
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Watch this if you liked: "Wonder Of Little Fatty" and "White Ants"

With the recent dengue-fever epidemic that has become one of the hotly-debated news topics in our country these days, the release of "Mokissu" couldn't be timely enough. That aside, "Mokissu" has the honour for being the first local school-themed comedy that blends with an educational theme surrounding Aedes mosquitoes. Ironically, this movie happens to be Pelangi Publishing Group's first foray into the movie industry (yes, that well-known publisher who publish educational books we all sure came across before).

The story goes like this: When a number of students in a Chinese secondary school have been infected by dengue fever, everyone starts to panic and take precaution on eliminating any sign of breeding Aedes mosquitoes within the school compound. Things get worse when the school principal (Soo Wee Seng) is down for dengue fever and the discipline supervisor Huang (Chen Sin Foo) is appointed as an acting principal to take care of the school matters. Soon a series of funny incidents surrounding four senior students - bucktooth Bao Ya (Danny Koo), beauty queen Ai Ling (Yumi Wong), Bao Ya's chubby buddy Han Wen (Toh Chai Chung) and Ai Ling's nosy friend Yi Wen (Lillian Wenwen) - quickly ensues.

Previously cutting his teeth on numerous school-themed TV movies including "White Ants" and "Wonder Of Little Fatty", Tai Min Hwee's feature directing debut in "Mokissu" proves that he's quite efficient on depicting comedy which touches on the everyday lives of today's youth culture.

The screenplay in which Min Hwee also wrote is locally relevant that we can easily identify from. Such topics which he manages to inject his unique sense of humour are the youngsters' obsession on taking selfies as well as the amount of time that general public loves to spend on their mobile phones. But this reviewer particularly enjoys the way Min Hwee parodies the Korean love drama by making some of his main cast speaks Korean during the hilarious dream sequence involving Bao Ya and Yi Wen's 'unfortunate' marriage in the church.

"Mokissu" is also blessed with a fine young cast. As Bao Ya, Danny Koo is quite amusing to watch for - especially with his prosthetic bucktooth, playing a silly and naive student who falls in love with the prettiest girl in the school, Ai Ling. Speaking of Ai Ling, Yumi Wong (actually her acting debut, even though local viewers already get to see her first in the recent Chinese New Year movie, "Ah Beng: Mission Impossible") is adequate enough for her eye-candy role. As Han Wen and Yi Wen, both Toh Chai Chung and Lillian Wenwen are equally effective as comic reliefs. As for the older cast, Chen Sin Foo almost steals the show with his nuanced comic timing as the old-fashioned discipline supervisor-turned-acting principal, Huang.

Despite some worthy moments here and there in the movie, "Mokissu" suffers quite a number of glaring flaws. This reviewer can't help it but notice the inconsistent colour correction within Nevin Hiong's uneven cinematography especially when comes to white colour (as evident in the student's uniform). Min Hwee's direction has its weak spot as well. Some of the comedy elements that he tries to pull off here fail to hit the marks. Other times, they also tend to be off-putting especially the annoying usage of cliched funny sound effects (you'll know when you hear it).

So, is this really 'Malaysia's most funny campus movie in the history' as heavily advertised in "Mokissu"? For this reviewer, it's far from the best. The movie may have been patchy in places, but remains a decent entertainment for a lighthearted local comedy.

Cinema Online, 10 March 2014